Tag: creative writing

raising kids…it ain’t easy

March 10th, 2020

Raising kids is not fun.

Sure, there are fun moments. There are times when you are amazed. In awe. In love. When it’s like this, it’s the purest form of love that there is. But it’s not like that often.

This is probably my fault. I have high expectations.

At 14 years old, even at 10, you should remember—most of the time—to brush your teeth, pick your dirty clothes up off the bathroom floor, not talk with food in your mouth, say please, thank you, excuse me, and get good grades.

Not great grades. Good grades.

School is your only job at this point.

Sure, you have a few measly chores to do. But other than that, all I expect is that you are respectful, kind, and that you do your best in school. I know that you aren’t an expert at everything. I understand that you don’t enjoy doing certain things. I get it. That’s life. That’s part of growing up, learning, and exploring.

You’re going to tell fibs. You’re a kid. You want to do what you want to do—eat candy and treats when you’re not supposed to, go to friends’ houses that I don’t like, and make bad choices that seem fun—I understand. But don’t lie. Don’t lie to me. Don’t lie to your Mom. Try not to lie to anyone. There will be exceptions to this rule that you will discover as you get older. Until you get to that point in life when you know a little white lie will save a whole lot of heartache, don’t do it.

That’s it really.

But not really.

Don’t half-ass things. When you have a chore to do, do it well. If you are writing a paper for English class, do it well. It’s important to learn early on that whatever it is that you’re doing, you should try to do it better than anybody else.

Why?

Because it makes a difference.

It makes a difference in how you move through life. It makes a difference in how others perceive you.

I know a lot of people that are half-assers. They aren’t happy. They will tell you that they are happy, that they wouldn’t want it any other way, but they are full of shit. How do I know this? Because the older you get, the better you get a detecting shit. Bullshit, in particular.

That’s why I can tell—nine times out of ten—if you are telling the truth or not.

I expect you to learn a lot of the simple things, because if you do, you will experience more success, love, and happiness than most people in this world.

I will not always be here to tell you once, twice, three times, and four to do your homework. Put your dirty cereal bowl in the dishwasher or give your Mom a hug. I will not be here long. You won’t either. This life is short. Time just keeps ticking. We can’t stop it. But if we can master the little things and look out for others and put good into this world, we can last. Long after we are gone.

I know you might not get this last part. That’s okay. Sometimes, I don’t think I get it either. Like when I yell at you. Or get in your space. Make you feel bad. Cry. I know I shouldn’t do that. That’s not what I set out to do. I’m learning.

Trying to figure this out as I go because I’m fully invested.

All in.

Not half-assing it, like so many other parents do.

~ KJ
the pit

February 23rd, 2020

In the kitchen. Taxes on my mind. Knowing I need to get them done because if done right, we’ll get money back. We need this money to live this life we’re living. I understand that the sum of your belongings means nothing. But once you accumulate and have, you expect. It’s ridiculousness at its best.

So, I’m making French Press coffee from beans I’ve just ground. Starbucks French Roast. And I’m falling into the pit of guilt. It’s not the guilt’s fault. See, I do this often. Every day. Many times each day. Instead of enjoying an experience, like a silky, smooth cup of coffee, I start thinking of the people waking up on the street. In the cold. People with real problems, like aching, starving bellies. Pain that they can’t get prescribed away. Humans, that for one reason or another, have chosen the street. Their decision-making may have not been well-informed and certainly could have been affected by mental illness, substance abuse, lack of education, disease, and general hopelessness. Or sometimes, people just get a bad shake. They are, of course, without choice. Surviving by sheer will.

And that’s only the beginning. I’ll find one of these folks in my head. See them, hear them, feel them, and wonder, how can I help? What am I able to do from my place here on the 45^th parallel to get the war vet to the soup kitchen and a counselor? How do I help the opiate addicted illegal immigrant and her three young boys out of the car their living in and into a home? And what about the old man living in his shack out in the sticks with no running water, no phone, no electricity? He can’t walk anymore. He finds it impossible to do much of anything. He sits in his chair, looking out over his frozen front yard toward the road where his mailbox used to be. It’s gone, he thinks. The snowplow that came through last week blasted through it, sending his disability check flying off into February, only to be buried out there somewhere with another layer of snow. Not that it matters. He can’t get to town to cash it, anyhow.

I sip the coffee. Damn, it is good.

I check my watch. An Apple watch, of course. Those are the gifts we give each other. Obnoxious. Does anybody really need to have the world strapped to their wrist? But it is telling me to get moving. Yesterday, I smashed my move goal. Burned just over 1,600 calories. Jogging, walking, elliptical, and free weights. And I’m shameful. How stupid is that? I’m ashamed that I’m able to do these things, look out for my health.

And I love the watch.

I head down to the basement. Get here to these keys. This computer works well. It’s taken the thoughts from inside of me and saved them for the past five years. That’s the typical age when one should consider replacing a laptop. I admit it. I’ve been looking at the 16” MacBook Pro.

Wasn’t it an apple that supposedly got all of us into this?

I’ve been abusing these keys for about twenty minutes. I’m at that point where I know I could go for hours—probably write The Great American Novel—but it’s here again. The pit. My daughter has friends over. Two of them. They slept over last night. It was my wife’s idea. She’s up there now, sipping tea. Touching her iPad Pro. Playing Candy Crush or shopping for clothes for our Spring Break trip. We’re going to Jamaica. But, I’m not up there, you see. Those little girls are chatting, munching cereal, slurping milk. There’s nothing I can do up there. I have nothing to offer, but I’m supposed to be up there. My wife may not actually think this, but that’s what the pit is telling me. I shouldn’t be down here writing, cleaning out the noggin’, getting myself centered, doing what I love—stringing words together. I should be up there.

And once I’m up there, doing whatever it is I can to help—putting away dishes, vacuuming, sitting on the couch and watching TV, just BEING there—the pit will remind me of what I committed to years ago, when I was just a kid.

I’m going to be a writer, I said.

But it will have to wait. At least until the taxes are done.

~ KJ
color

July 9th, 2019

We walk past the boat harbor. Sailboats bob in the bay. Purple and yellow flowers line the sidewalk as we pass the water treatment plant. They are not enough to take the mind and nose away from the stench, but the smell doesn’t bother us. It’s something we have come to know as home. I think of the waste—from people and pets, from all that we consume—running through pipes and filters. Water getting clean again, running back through more filters and pipes. Running out of hoses. Filling glasses, bathtubs, and ice cube trays. Drip, drip, dripping from leaky faucets and seeping into our dreams at night.

“Look! Look!” Oogie shouts, pointing toward a flock of herring gulls soaring overhead. They move over the harbor and the playground, past the bandshell toward Lake Huron.

“Pretty,” my wife says.

And it is.

All of it is.

The shimmering waves. The squeaky swings as kids sway back and forth, laughing and shrieking. The big ugly mountain of salt kept near the river for the winter that’s months out but getting closer every day. The crumbling armory that’s been turned into a place for laser tag. And my wife and daughter searching every milkweed along the river for caterpillars on the edge of the city mowing line.

They find four tonight.

“We need fresh stuff to eat,” my wife says. Not to me, but to the two fat colorful creatures she has on a leaf in her hand.

“Yes!” Oogie cheers. “These guys are hungry!” She is beaming, carrying two caterpillars in her small hands.

A monarch butterfly rises from a lilac bush when we are about three blocks from home. We are silent but happy as it follows us as if watching to make sure that we’ll do good. When it is satisfied that we mean well, it flies off toward our neighbor’s garden.

When we get home, I mix a drink. It’s time to unwind. I will sit on the front porch and listen to this small town settle its way to sleep. But first, I look into the world my wife and daughter have worked so hard to create. Their butterfly house. The place where caterpillars eat and poop and eat and poop and grow and grow until they know it’s time to climb to the top, form a J, then tremble and shake themselves into a smooth, shiny chrysalis.

Last year, it gave birth to nineteen monarchs. My wife and daughter named them all. We only lost one. I’m not sure of the name. Something like Stan or Earl. Definitely a male. He rose up to fly away, made a wide loop out over the yard then came right back and landed on the porch in front of our dog. Our cute, harmless Buggle that apparently thought it was some sort of treat. She chomped little Stan or Earl up into bits, spit him out, then cowered between my legs. I moved quickly to pick up the pieces, sure that my daughter would be devasted.

“Aw,” she said. “It’s okay, Dad. He probably wouldn’t have made it far anyway.”

“Survival of the fittest,” my wife added.

So far this year, there are fifteen waiting to make the change. Nine chrysalises and six caterpillars. They haven’t given them official names yet, but they have a list. Like parents choosing possible names for their unborn baby. Waiting as patiently as possible for that new and incredible life to have its one chance to wake this world to color again.

~ K.J.
nice or not

April 10th, 2019
nice or not Download

It’s so early, but so late.

I wouldn’t have this perspective if I’d had more to eat or less to drink. Nothing would make sense, and these words would not fall into place like this had I not gone through all that I have in my life.

And I haven’t gone through much.

At least that’s what they tell me.

I am after all, white.

And male.

And semi-privileged. Which means my parents worked their asses off to make sure I had what I needed to succeed—food, shelter, and an insurmountable amount of love.

But I don’t want to get into the haves and have nots. I did that once before—writing about riots and the poor decisions people make when they are oppressed and frustrated—and a woman said that she felt sorry for me. I didn’t understand, she said. I couldn’t understand, she said. I was ignorant, she said. All because I mentioned that the issues we have can be boiled down to something simple—you’re either nice or you’re not.

My kids get it. Other kids get it too. They don’t see color or history or gender or whatever other labels we do. They just see good. Unless their parents have poisoned them. Making them see what they want them to.

You know who you are. Devils.

We do everything we can to complicate this life. Create issues that don’t exist. Blame people for their ignorance and try to push them into some category that says—indirectly, of course—that they are less than others.

But that’s not true.

The overweight fella collecting carts at Walmart is not all the different from the man loading his cart with organic veggies, cage free eggs, protein shakes, and booze.

The elderly man offering savings in the form of a coupon-filled flier at the entrance of Meijer is not so different than the lawyer and his family buying candles, chocolate, and video games.

We are all in this together.

Human beings on a big ball of dirt and water whirling through space.

But we don’t want to break down to the basics.

We want to be special. To be heard.

We are so selfish that we believe it’s early, but late.

We believe that our perspective has the power to shape. That if we have less to eat or more to drink everything will make sense. Words will fall into place and finally we will express all we’ve gone through in this life.

We are ignorant, they say. All because we believe the issues we face can be boiled down simplicity—either you’re nice or you’re not.
- KJ
magic stuff

December 3rd, 2018

December 3, 2018

We’ve got the cold wrapping up all around us. It’s time for long johns, parkas, and insulated boots. Trekking through snow and slush. Penguin-stepping over ice. Or dodging puddles. It is Michigan, after all. Twenty-seven degrees right now at 7:32 pm but it could be 45 by tomorrow morning. Even with all the gadgetry, computer models, and confident weathermen and women, we never know what we’re gonna get. We can predict and assume, extrapolate and forecast all we want, but the truth is we just don’t know. Try as we might to make sense of this world, there are factors—magic stuff, I like to think—beyond our reach, our science, and our beliefs. But that’s just me. Forty-five years old and realizing more and more each day how little I understand and know.

~ K.J.
understand

October 2nd, 2018

I have many faults.

I’m impatient. Lack discipline.

I’m too lazy to understand

our differences.

And so,

I get stuck

in deep ruts.

My wheels spin.

I create paranoia.

Make problems that don’t exist.

Because I’m bored.

Like a coyote in a cage.

Running back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and back and forth.

Again.

I don’t stretch beyond what I know, so I do what I’ve been doing all along.

Dying without ideas.

Even if it’s wrong.

Because it is easier to reject the unknown than it is to understand.

~ K.J.
devastation like this

September 20th, 2018

(Please note, this is a creative work. If you need help, please call 1-800-273-8255. Or reach out to family or friends. It’s bleak, but it isn’t worth shutting the light out.)

I know how deep it gets. A switch clicks. And there is no coming back from it.

Whatever IT is.

Could be chemicals. Or the devil. Or any combination of fears, ignorance, and neglect. But it is real.

I know because it has pulled many people into it.

Including me.

The dark, sticky, sad, angry mess.

Where you can stay in bed for days and not give a shit.

When nobody understands how deep the rabbit hole gets.

And you find beauty and comfort in the darkest, most unfriendly places.

One night, I stopped a friend from pulling the trigger. It was accidental. I had just rented Conspiracy Theory and stopped by to return his Van Halen tape. When I walked into his house, he was sitting in the middle of the kitchen with his forehead resting on the barrel of a 12 gauge. He had his shoes off and his toe on the trigger.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

I didn’t know, so I said nothing. But I did walk over and smack him in the side of the head with an open hand, and then I took the gun.

He cried and hugged me and said he was sorry, but I knew he’d be back again.

And he did it. Finally. Eight years later. After his kids left to live with his ex-wife and her new husband.

I wonder if he waited, paused at the sound of a car coming down the road. If he hoped it was another accident in the making—a friend with a cassette tape and a Mel Gibson movie.

It comes suddenly. Ruthlessly.

One minute I’m wondering at the strength and balance of my twelve-year-old boy as he beats opponent after opponent on the soccer field. The next, I’m thinking about a friend I had in high school—an acquaintance really—that made an impact when nobody else could.

He had a full-time job. Drove a CJ-5. Was upbeat, friendly, and always out for fun. One time, he took me aside because he was concerned about how I was handling the break up with my long-time girlfriend. He asked if I was depressed. If I was going to make it. Offered to be there. Anytime. Anywhere. For me. He told me this under the bleachers at a high school football game. Both of us sipping Mohawk and Mountain Dew Big Gulps.

I would never have imagined that thirty years later he would give in. That his wife would find him hanging from the rafters of the garage. Twitching. Not strong enough to lift him up and save him.

Then again, there has always been devastation like this.

Three from elementary school, that I know of.

Two from high school.

One from college.

And two co-workers.

People so sad and disconnected that they took pills, fashioned nooses, and put guns to their heads. Not because life was bad, but because it was so good, and they never knew how to feel the way they were supposed to.

It’s hard to get up and just BE every day. To maintain the happiness, patience, and normality everyone expects. But it is doable. And it is possible.

Pull yourself out of the depths into the light, so you can see and breathe again.

Know how deep it gets. That the switch clicks. And that there’s no coming back from it.

Whatever IT is.

It could be the chemicals. Or the devil. Or any combination of fears, ignorance, and neglect. But it is real.

I know because time and time again it tries with all its might to pull me in, and down and under, but it never wins.

~ K.J.
bull run

August 23rd, 2018

It’s a strange trip. Buying the dips. Waiting. Patiently. For the bulls to run. I hope it’s soon. I want to be able to help as many as I should. Not with these little words or necessary acts of kindness—though those will never stop—but with cold hard cash. I want to set up my kids. Pay off our bills. Make sure my parents and in-laws are set. People that have worked their whole lives shouldn’t have to worry about healthcare, where they are going to live, or buying groceries.

How in the hell we ever let it get this way is beyond me.

I am going to donate.

I am going to create.

I am going to travel and learn and listen so that I can get better at detecting the bullshit, discovering the problems, and developing solutions. I will not be about dividing. I will not be about separating. I will unite and fight and never lose sight of where I came from.

There will never be anybody in my back pocket or sitting on my shoulder telling me what to do. I don’t need that. I know right from wrong. I see the aches and pains. And when the stampede finally comes, I’ll be ready. Hands out, reaching. Ready to give as much as I can. Away.

I will wake early. I will read more. I will write more. I will walk more. Think more. Talk more. I will find the deepest rabbit holes. I will scour the surface. I will be the eccentric fella in the big old house with the pretty wife and energetic kids.

I guess you could say I’ll be me. Just the same as I am now, but with more resources to help the world.

It’s nice to dream.

To not think about the bad. To focus on the good.

And when I get like this, I feel strongly that everyone has the power to change. To rise up. To be better.

You just have to embrace this strange trip. Buy the dips and wait. Patiently. For the bulls to run.

~ K.J.
Kids, look up.

August 18th, 2018

8/18/18—For my kids.

You gotta look up. Look forward. At the sky. If you stare too much at the ground beneath your feet, you miss out. On smiling strangers. Monarchs bouncing through the air. Clouds that look like animals. Maybe something from last night’s dream.

It’s easy to miss out on opportunity, to put your tail between your legs and mosey along meekly if you are not observing, listening, open for more. Don’t be afraid of getting hurt, losing your way, or failing. Mistakes are for learning. Those that don’t understand that, those focused on perfection, are the most flawed of all. But don’t hold them in poor regard or avoid them. Embrace them. Empathize.

Saturday morning bells from the church down the street. It’s nine a.m. and counting. Seconds to minutes, minutes to hours, hours to weeks and months to…

Is there any time at all? What’s this insatiable desire we have with putting numbers to everything? Clocks and codes. Sizes and calorie count. Weight and height. Cell phone numbers, serial numbers, social security numbers, and those most wanted numbers of all—those that land on our paychecks. How did we get so brainwashed? So controlled.

Ever think about how hard it is to think for yourself? Probably not. Isn’t that part of our problem? We have this magnificent existence with heart and brain and gut and spirit, yet we give it up without much care if it means we will meet someone’s approval. Kind words. A compliment. Our name on a plaque, respected in meetings, or put down in black-and-white print. Shouldn’t the one thing we simply need be our own approval? A recognition earned when we finally find the way to live within the many fibers of this daily existence without losing our happiness.

Some people don’t understand that, and never will. But give them the benefit of the doubt.

It is possible to be a devoted husband and dad but speak honestly about the trials, oddities, and outright foolishness of marriage and family. It’s possible to be best friends if you accept each other’s ugliness. A person can be an excellent employee for a gas station, a non-profit, or a billion-dollar company day-in-and-day-out while questioning capitalism, the thirst for oil, and voting whatever way they damn well please. And a person can do these things while being an artist, an engineer, an entomologist, a doctor, a dreamer, or a drummer in a band. Don’t get caught up in the game the world plays at pitting one side against the other, and don’t look down on others. We are meant to be multidimensional. We are meant to question and learn and share and think and feel. We aren’t here for anybody else, but us. And the trick is that everybody else and everything we do helps make us…well, US.

You can be one thing to one person and another thing to another. And you can do both of them well. Don’t get pigeonholed. Don’t ever become someone’s bitch, even if you have to play the role for a while. That’s what this life is about. Playing roles. Doing what it takes through the art of compromise a little here and a little there without totally compromising the fiber of your being. Remember, it’s quite all right to bend—just never, ever break.

You gotta look up, kids. Look forward. At the sky. If you stare too much at the ground beneath your feet, you’ll miss out. On smiling strangers. Monarchs bouncing through the air. Clouds that look like animals. Maybe something from last night’s dream.

~ K.J
we’d never do that

February 21st, 2018

Everyone suddenly knows what it is that drives a young man to arm himself with a weapon and extinguish light.

Driven by their own beliefs, agendas, and experience, they label, pigeon-hole, and validate. Nobody seems to consider that perhaps all of it is more complicated than what we read and hear and see. We want so much to make sense of it, to understand and control it, that we do all that we can to simplify it.

After all, we have kids. We want them safe. We are good, God-fearing folks, and we believe most definitely that there’s a right and a wrong. That it is good or evil, black or white, left or right.

But maybe that’s the problem.

We spend so much time pushing people into places we think they belong that we forget.

We’re animals.

Sleeping and waking and working and faking. Doing whatever it takes to survive.

And when we are cornered, afraid of what may become of us and everything we believe to be true and right and just, we bite. We fight. We lie and cheat and steal and walk into schools with weapons wanting to kill those sacred, beautiful things we once had—innocence, possibility, dreams—all because we’re afraid that life as we know it is being destroyed by the OTHERS. The liberals, the conservatives, the waffling wimps in the middle, the whites, the aliens, the blacks.

It’s always somebody else’s fault.

The immigrants. The corporations. The lazy bastards at home milking the system.

It’s never us.

We’d never do that.

Ever.

~ KJ